EA Sports UFC Review

EA Sports UFC could have been great, but thanks to a lack of modes and customisation options, it's simply ok.

UFC could have been something special. The promotion is a goldmine of content with an incredible roster and a rich history. So why is this game so threadbare?

For starters, this is an arcade fighter wrapped around the rules of the Octagon – that’s a good thing. Much in the same way that Fight Night Round 3 didn’t follow the flow of a boxing match, UFC is more of a slobberknocker than its real-world counterpart, taking a liberal interpretation of 'punches in bunches'.

This is entertaining for the most part, except when the fight hits the mat. Here it becomes a torrid mess of right-stick swirling, with all the strategy of a bar brawl. The amount of transitions is absurd, featuring reversals and full mounts every few seconds. I don't know why EA changed the mechanics from MMA, but UFC fails to explain its intricacies and basic mechanics leading to a lot of initial guesswork followed by trial and error.

The other real issue is the lack of content. Granted, the roster is big, but this is only fun if you have a lot of things to do with them. A fighting game should offer WWE-levels of customisation and creativity, and this lacks anything of the sort.

In the Fight Night series, I had Michael Jackson fight Gandhi for the title, but here, unless you want to create generic white/black/hispanic/asian fighter, you’re out of luck outside of GameFace. Furthermore, despite having the women’s bantamweight division, you can’t create a female fighter in career mode. There doesn’t seem to be any way to download other player’s creations either.

Finally there's the modes, or more specifically, lack of. There's no Create-A-Tournament or Pay-Per-View: just quick fight, online, career and more tutorials in the form of challenges. Imagine FIFA with only quick match – it gets old fast.

UFC is simply OK when it should have been great. Considering how long it's been in development, and the breadth of content at EA's disposal, I can’t help but be disappointed by what’s on offer.

8 Comments

User Comments

Actually NBA 2K14 added new features like My GM,The Park, and the new My Player story line and EA had 7 extra months of development time than 2K. All that really matters is that you're having fun with the game. Me myself, besides the graphics, I prefer UFC 3 on my PS3. In the new one the ref doesn't even get involved and cuts and damage magically disappear after the bell. Everyone seems to have the same moves and abilities etc...

I will more than likely be biased, as I am a UFC fan and have enjoyed all UFC games. Nonetheless, I did enjoy the demo!

Boycee, have you played previous UFC games? I won't question your history of the sport, but its up to you whether or not you want to elaborate on that. When the fighting comes to the mat, the previous UFC games required you to use the right stick to transition, block submission attempts, and trying to gain the advantage by tiring your opponent and go for the kill with a kimura.

Pride was only introduced into UFC 3. I am curious how Pride feels in this compared to UFC 3. Does it still include the wacky English translator? Is there more to Pride than UFC 3 this time around as well? I know you can have fights in Pride in career mode and ultimately become the undisputed champion across UFC and Pride. I like Pride as much as UFC. Many fighters from the UFC also fought in Pride such as:

When you say few legends? Care to go further? I know Royce Gracie will be classed as a legend, seeing as he's a pre-order bonus at GAME. I gather Chuck Liddell, Tito Ortiz will be and probably Brock Lesnar?

Past UFC games never had that WWE customization, yet felt very familiar when creating you're own fighter. The likes of sponsors was the only really "creative" bit about the fighter customization, so I don't know what you were expecting in that department.

"I don't know why EA changed the mechanics from MMA" I'm rather glad, yet never played EA's MMA, so my view could well be redundant... EA's MMA did get a respectable 79 metacritic, though a consistent problem was the way it played compared to THQ's UFC, back in the day...

It's a real shame that it doesn't live up to my expectations, I was really looking forward to picking this up on Friday. But I guess I can just use the money to go get rat-arsed instead. When God gives you lemons and all that jazz…

Brett's feature is much more eye-opening as to the game's shortcomings but EA seriously need to just steal that 'create your own PPV' streaming idea because that'd sell me on the game straight away.

Its the first iteration on next gen of course its going to be lacking features, look at nba 2k14. I just picked up my preorder and im not mad at all. The game is fun and full of sweet ko moments. Also you can easily do a championship fight by switching options in fight now as someone else said. Overall, im very happy with my purchase.

The career mode only allows you to compete with a created fighter, not the UFC roster. I feel like my analogy explains it: there isn't enough to do with the roster that's available to the player. Sorry that you feel my review is lousy, but you can also read my feature which goes into greater detail.